Two recordings for critique - Indie rock and "alternative". All input welcome!

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xtjdx

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Two recordings for critique - Indie rock and "alternative". All input welcome!

Hey guys. Came here from recording.org boards where I got no response whatsoever despite logs showing at least 20 people downloading the songs. I'm hoping this board will be a bit more helpful in critiquing the quality of these recordings.
Anyway, I recently recorded two bands. The first is an indie rock band by the name of Almighty Flying Machine. They are based in Charlotte, North Carolina and are gaining quite a fan base (for good reason, too). The sound they wanted for their EP was a very natural one. They had me record them on a 1/2" reel to reel because of the great analog quality (I don't blame them). I think these songs turned out pretty well, but I'd still like suggestions on what could be improved upon (in terms of the actual recording - performance is something that AFM does a great job of). I'm going to post two tracks.
Track 1 - Call Her the Craze
Track 2 - I Was an Urban Cowboy (this song is a personal favorite, but they don't play it live anymore... saddening)

The second band I recorded is a spazzy, frenetic screamo-violence (alternative is a much more topic-friendly description, right?) outfit called Boa Narrow (formerly Walsham). They are based out of Greensboro, North Carolina. This band puts on an amazing show and plays their songs the right way while doing it (which is very surprising considering how hard that is to do when you're swinging your guitar around frantically). They (understandably) wanted a very raw sound to their recording, without sacrificing the "produced" sound. I had everything levelled out perfectly and they tell me "no, put the guitars a little back in the mix, bass higher, vocals lower." So, it's their record! The first track is 30 seconds, and the second track is around 4 minutes. Be forewarned, these guys play pretty chaotic music, so if you don't have an open mind/ears musically, you may not want to listen.
Track 1 (listen for "STOMP ON THE SQUIRRELS!" in the first line)
Track 2 (this song is about Amelia Earheart)

I recorded both these guys on very mediocre equipment, and for what I have I think I did very good work for both of them (not to mention I did it for free - something that is rare nowadays!).
Equipment used :
Fostex Reel to Reel
Athlon 64 3400+; 1gb RAM; Cubase SX 2.0
Two Delta 1010s
Aphex pre
Audioworks Spirit E12 mixer
Samson CO2 condensors
AKG D112
Shure SM57
Audio-Technica AT3035
Sennheiser Evolutions (toms)
Shure SM58
Behringer Dynamics (Boa Narrow was a live recording, so I used some of these little workhorses on guitar and bass)

LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU GUYS THINK! ALL OPINIONS ARE APPRECIATED AND WELCOMED!

Tim
 
I Was An Urban Cowboy:

Drums need more solidity to them at the start, they get kind of lost in the too-loud guitar feedback. In general they sound a bit cardboard and thin at the intro. Later on they sound better. Why did you let them sound butt at the intro?

In general the high hat is way too loud for my tastes. Makes things sound unprofessional and garage band.

For the most part this is really good recording wise. I'd like a little more weight to the toms though.


Boa Narrow:

Same issue with the high hat, but this time the overheads are a little too loud in parts. God these guys sound like Glassjaw meets Voivod.

I think the production is good, but the drummer plays some stupid sounding stuff that really hurts the song. Vocals could use a little thickening.
 
Heh, I have the same opinion on the feedback and the toms (although I think the feedback is going to be a lead-in from another song... that's how they do it live and it sounds very good).
The sound they wanted was the garage-ish sound. It's their music, so they get what they want in it. They didn't want to mic the toms, which I advised heavily against, just for this reason. I'm going to bring the guitars down quite a bit as that has been the biggest complaint so far. I'm not really sure what to do for the hats since they weren't miked and are still very audible (moreso than the cymbals... weird). Maybe some creative EQ will take care of that problem.
As for Boa Narrow, these guys are... well... crazy. I definitely hear what you're saying about the overheads. The drummer is actually very very talented, but since this was a live recording they were getting really into it and didn't care as much about consistency or song structure as giving a helluva performance. I'd say they did the job. I am definitely going to give the vocals some processing and warm them up a bit. Thanks for your input.
 
High hats bleed into *everything* if the drummer doesn't know how to control their dynamics... which means hitting the cymbals fairly lightly, the high hat lightly, and pounding the toms/snare.

My advice for the overheads would be compress them to the point that the high hat and cymbals are equal in volume.
 
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